1. Level 4 Diploma in Therapeutic Counselling
Case Study writing
Level 4 Diploma in Therapeutic Counselling

2. Case Study
It is important that your written case study reflects the particular quality of the relationship you have created with your client.
What we would like to see and what we would like demonstrated is the way in which you have achieved this.

3. The Case Study needs :
An introduction- outline what you are going to do in the case study and how you intend to do this. A middle section which outlines the client, issue etc and the work undertaken A conclusion: summarise the case study and make recommendations for future work.

4. 1. Outline the personal history
Include age, sex, family history, current relationship, family
situation and occupational situation.

5. Counselling arrangements
Briefly describe the setting in
which the counselling is provided:
The frequency and length of
counselling sessions, how long you’ve been
counselling the client, and the number of sessions which have taken place to date.
What was your initial contract with the client, and has this been reviewed?

6. Presenting issues
Briefly outline why the client has requested counselling now. As far as possible, try and use the client’s language.
Please include your initial subjective responses to the client, noting your response to differences between you and your client.

7. Your assessment of this client
Describe your assessment of the client and the nature of your work together making reference to relevant theory.
a. On what criteria did you base your initial assessment?
b. What is you client’s concept of self?
e. What was your response to both the client and their
presenting issues? How did you decide that you were able
to work with this client?
f. What did you agree would be
the focus of your work?

8. The presenting past
Describe the relationship between responses to current issues with
key events from the client’s past, e.g. loss.

9. Counselling process Describe the counselling process
with reference to the beginning,
middle and end stages. How do you consider your client changed?
What contribution did counselling make to this?
Evaluate your ability to demonstrate the core conditions at the different stages of the process.

10. Supervision
Throughout your case study, we would like to see how you have used supervision in working with this client.

11. Practitioner issues
In relation to your work with this client, evaluate your ability to hold professional boundaries and work within an ethical framework.
You may find it helpful to mention any particular critical experiences to illustrate your practice.

12. You need to include:
Why did you decide to work this way with this particular client?
Demonstrate your understanding of the theory underpinning your choice of intervention(Unit 2,3,4,5,6)
How has this impacted on your theoretical understanding?(Unit 6)
How have you identified and focused on the client’s needs and concerns?( Unit 3,4,5)
Your awareness of the client-counsellor relationship (Unit 2,3,5)

13. Continued An evaluation of the skills /techniques used. (Unit 6)
How did your use of the skills impact on the client?(Unit 2,4,5,6)
Awareness of self in the process and its affect on the work with your client (did you make any changes in the way you work as a result of your self- awareness?(Unit 5,7)
Creativity using the skills, use of self and a coherent approach. (Unit 5,7)